85 Comments

When the climate meeting of Copenhagen approaches from the consequences of the climate catastrophe, the kauhumaalailu [worldwide panic?] will accelerate. The media become full of the news which tells about the melting of glaciers, about the rise of the surface of the sea, about the storms and floods it is claimed that the global warming causes. The warming is described before as unparalleled.

MOT clarified on what kind of science the claims about the warming caused by the human being and about its dramatic consequences are based. It proved that the studies from the unheard of rise of the heat during the last decades of the globe do not last a closer examination before.

Scientific unanimity does not dominate about the amount of the warming caused by the carbon dioxide emissions either. According to the study of the fresh MIT the doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would be enough to raise the heat of the world the maximum of 0,5, from a 2,5 – 6,0 degree predicted by the computer models position.

Here’s a goggle translation that appears to prohibit copy and paste.
Warning: The translation of another article in the link contains an unexpectedly amusing, but NSFW word having something to do with waste.

Re: ianl8888 (#21),
I guess you mean this
“Tuoreen MIT:n tutkimuksen mukaan”
which translates as something like “According to a recent study from MIT”. It refers to Lindzen&Choi, and AFAIK they also have Lindzen’s interview in the program.

Re: Kaj Luukko (#31),
I’m sure we’ll find out if it is the same paper already on Monday from your upcoming “rebuttal” of the program. Since you have now introduced yourself over here, it would be nice if you wrote your “rebuttal” in English. Then also a larger part of CA readership could enjoy how you, brilliantly I’m sure, tear down all the work done by Steve and others. Maybe you can even convince us that remains of roadbuilding in sediments of Korttajärvi actually teleconnects to rapid global warming.

I don’t think your comment was quite fair. Spencer has problems with the L&C paper but he did not attempt to reproduce it in the sense I would use the term. Spencer did a number of things, including comparing model results used by L&C to model results from a model Spencer prefers, but this is not the same as reproducing the results.

Steve: I’m playing sporadically. It’s a groin injury on my push leg. When it hurts too much, I lay off. I had a nice win in doubles league last week though. Won at #1 team (Division 2) in 5 games (with another wily veteran) against a 30-year and 40-year old. Took me 24 hours to recover.

Re: UC (#11),
my sources tell yes, and we might even see upside down Tiljander with an authentic view from Lake Korttäjärvi, a glimse of Rahmsmoothing, and a dog eating Jones’ data :)

Re: Bill W (#7),
I do not have too much to do with this, although I did consult them on some issues, mainly about rahmsmoothing and Steve’s work (before they interviewed him). I originally helped them in the previous program (see transcript in #9), which eventually lead to the discovery of Rahmstorf’s “parameter change” in the Copenhagen report. This time I made also a figure (a better version of this one) illustrating “Rahmcentering”; we’ll see if they are going to use it … it is only half an hour program! The last part of the program abstract apparently refers to Lindzen&Choi if someone is wondering.

“Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period.”

I think this applies to Steve McIntyre – keep up the good work. The journals like Science and Nature should try and keep up.

And did you hear? In Britain, global warming is now officially recognised for what it really is: a religion.

I am thinking of crafting Steve a large desk made out of western
Bristlecone pine, with larch inlay. One drawer will be permanently
stuck closed, one will be turned upside down and another will work
off and on….will be in a sense unreliable. Flat desk top that
ramps up abruptly towards the rear.

Re: Steve McIntyre (#47),
not yet, but it will be (after the show has aired). Unfortunately, I think they are blocking IPs outside of Finland, but not sure about that (maybe someone can find a proxy to go around that?). I’ll post the link when the show is available.

After seeing the document I can only congratulate the MOT-team and hope for a quick translation available. As a European legislator I think we should think twice before we continue our climate actions in Copenhagen; the efforts so fare have been more or less exporting pollution and importing unemployment, without any proper results.

Re: Eija-Riitta Korhola (#50), Eija-Riitta: “… exporting pollution and importing unemployment, without any proper results.” That will leave a mark! How many of your fellow legislators are thinking hard about the science and the empirical realities rather than a romantic vision of an environment without any human beings?

As the producer of MOT I’d like to thank Steve for giving his valuable time to our show. Unfortunately, the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE is bound by coypright agreements tht prevent the publication of our productions abroad. So you should be content with the transcript, which portrays the content accurately. TV pictures are mostly for emotional effect anyway, so you don’t need them because we are talking about a serious subject.

I’d like to raise a point that I already posted at Watts up with that: the two curves we show about the Korttajärvi varves are flipped, but so is the y-axis, so what’s the crime we are alluding to? We talked about this at length with experts and got technical explanations that we decided to trust. But how to explain the apparent problem in lay terms – any suggestions?

Take a thermometer, turn it upside down. It’s still reading temperature, right? But now lower temps are when the liquid moves up and higher temps are when the liquid moves down. It doesn’t matter whether the thermometer is rightside up or upside down it’s still measuring temperature because both the temperature scale and the movement of the liquid are correlated. This is why numerous people argued that the orientation didn’t matter. They didn’t understand the problem.
.
Now take a thermometer and flip the scale so 100C is 0C and 0C is 100C ie water boils at 0C and freezes at 100C. The thermometer is no longer measuring temperature, no matter what orientation it is in. This is what happened to the varves.

I saw the program yesterday as well and I would like to hear a sound explanation on the question raised by Matti Virtanen. According to the figures shown in the MOT program, BOTH the graph and the scale were upside down. So as a layman I am asking, what is the issue here? Explain it in a way that a non-expert can understand, please.

Indeed they were, but in opposite directions. So while the data was flipped from down to up, the scale was flipped from up to down, reversing the true meaning of the data.
.
When Tiljander did the study on the varves, they were interpreted as :-
.
Thin varve = warm temperatures
Thick varve = cold temperatures
.
When Mann used the Tiljander data, he changed the scale so it became:-
.
Thin varves = cold temperatures
Thick varves = warm temperatures
.
This is equivalent to taking a thermometer and interpreting 100C = freezing and 0C = boiling. A nonsense interpretation of the physical properties of the data.
.
He did this because, in modern times, the data was compromised by human activites which increased the amount of sediment in the lakes. This produced thick varves which, coincidentally, correlated well with temperature. Mann therefore seized on the correlation to make the assumption that thick varves must represent temperature. An assumption that he would have noticed was clearly incorrect if he had bothered to read the work done by Tiljander.
.
After he had flipped the scale, he then flipped both the data and the scale so down became up. This didn’t correct the fact that the scale was wrong to begin with.
.
Hope this helps. It is difficult to get your head round at first.

Re: DaveJR (#57),
That’s a pretty darn good lay summary. It makes you wonder why Mann didn’t get it – why he dismissed Steve’s discovery as “bizarre”. The Finns got it right away. Kaufman got it pretty quick. I got it right away. DaveJR obviously got it. Even William Connolley eventually got it. So what didn’t Mann “get”, and why didn’t he get it?

Thank you for your response. First, I can’t understand how you can flip data and the scale in “opposite directions”, if you flip them both? If you flip data point or the scale upside down (multiply X with -1) you can only get -X, right? What other ways is there to “flip” a number than by multiplying it by -1?
.
Second, I have the Tiljander et al. 2003 and Mann et al. 2008 papers now in front of me. I just don’t find the misinterpretation by Mann that you are suggesting. Tiljander concludes in her work that 980-1250 AD were hotter (lower values for x-ray density in the graph) than for the years around it. The x-ray density is indeed lower in Mann’s Fig S9. It is noteworthy that in Mann’s Fig S10 the Tiljander data is considered hotter between 980-1250 and in fact it seems that the Tiljander data has been excluded in the graph after 1800 AD – Because it was corrupted by human activity.
.
So I really don’t see what Mann has done wrong with Tiljander data. I hope Mr. Virtanen, McIntyre or Jean S can point out what I misunderstood here.
.
(And to clarify, I didn’t find these papers on my own. I was directed to the discussion on the topic here (comments 101-112): http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2009/10/tiljander.php)

Re: Tuomas Helin (#59),
Tuomas, knowing your background, I’m sure you can understand this issue if you want to, but I’m not 100% sure if you are willing to.

No, you can not get the interpretation how the series were used in Mann et al (or Kaufman et al) by reading the paper and checking figures (you can get the Tiljander’s interpretation by reading Tiljander et al, which I think you already did). You need to understand the method(s) used, and preferably read the code. I think, for you, the easiest way to assure yourself about this is to check the orientation (scale) of Tiljander series in Mann’s figure, and combine that with the fact that Tiljander series were screened (they passed) for positive correlation during post 1850 period with respect to Finnish temperature (which has an upward trend).

There isn’t any question that the Tiljander series are upside down in their contribution to the Mann reconstruction. Please see the original post on the matter http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=3967 and a more recent discussion http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=7411 . People like Connolley have pretended that the point is no more than misunderstanding the sign of a coefficient in a regression. This is disinformation, pure and simple. Obviously Jean S and I and others understand the sign of a coefficient. There are several things wrong with how Mann’s algorithm handles this series – Mann’s algorithm latched onto a spurious correlation; this resulted in the series being inverted in its contribution to both the CPS and EIV reconstructions.

With Korttajärvi just say what Mann did. During the 1800-2000 sediments on the lake grow much faster than ever before, due the agriculture, dam building, even water pollution. Mann correlated this with climate warming. Then, the original authors concidered the very thin layers of MWP as an indicator of a warm climate with less snow and mild winters, but Mann correlates the thin layers to cold climate.

I can assure you that I just want to find out the truth on this issue. The way the Tiljander data ‘flipping’ was discussed in MOT was pure ridiculous (showing two graphs where both the scale and graph were upside down = nothing changed) and I really want to find out if your original claim was this simple or not.
.
Until now I’ve just read the conclusions Tiljander made and compared the Tiljander Fig 5 with Mann S9 & S10 and made the interpretation I wrote in the earlier comment. Going into methodology, understanding and discussing it in English might be a bit overwhelming but I will try to understand what was written in the original posts.
.
Meanwhile, JeanS, please contact me via e-mail if you are willing to clarify the issue in Finnish. I guess that as an administrator you can get my e-mail address provided with this comment.

Based on your posts, your English is perfectly adequate to understand the simple concepts involved. I suggest that you read the CA posts (links provided above) before you ask Jean S to spend more time on this. There is NOTHING complicated about it. Mann 2008 used the series upside down.

I read the older posts by Mr McIntyre and didn’t find answers to my question.
.
The Tiljander data is used in Mann SI Fig S10, right? The time period 980-1250 AD is indeed hotter in the Figure than LIA for example, just like Tiljander had concluded. If the Tiljander data would have been used wrong-way-around by Mann et al as claimed, the Tiljander data would differ here from the other proxies and be clealy visible in the figure, right? On the other hand, there’s no downward ‘blade of the stick’ visible in the S10 either. So it seems that only part of Tiljander data was used when the Fig S10 was drewn. At least no upside-down use of the data is not visible in MWP, 980-1250 AD in the figure.
.
But figures are only figures. Where is it explained how Mann dealt with the Tiljander data in his study?

Thank you for your clarification, I had indeed misunderstood the Figure S10.
.
I don’t want to be a nuisance, but still need to continue as I’d like to understand this case and your claim thoroughly. So if I seem over-repetitive or slow, please don’t get annoyed. My goal is not to be disrespectful, but just truly want to understand the case you have made and now presented in the MOT tv-show.
.
So do you have a post (or if you can point it out in the Mann 2008 data) where it can be seen that the Tiljander data is really considered upside-down by Mann? I read the two posts you linked above and just found the same data – both above and below the x-axis in the two pictures. As I understand mathemathics, one can have the data in Fig S9 in whatever direction, just if both the scale and the graph are kept in the same direction (x=1 -x=-1). For Tiljander data, this seems to be the case. So the Fig S9 really doesn’t tell the reader if Mann has used the data upside-down or not. Where can I find the confirmation then? I’m more than willing to use plenty of time to get sure of the validity of your claim.

Screening, when used, employed one-sided tests only when a definite sign could be a priori reasoned on physical grounds.

He seems to imply that Korttajärvi sediment temperature response has an ambiguous sign (although he avoids saying it clearly). I’m no expert but using something as a temperature proxy without knowing the sign of response would seem strange. A Tiljander co-author was seen in the documentary indicating they had reasoned the sign on physical grounds (therefore being able to comment on MWP etc.)

Potential nonclimatic influences on the Tiljander and other proxies were discussed in the SI, which showed that none of our central conclusions relied on their use.

If he knew he used the data right, he could have stated it in clear terms instead of adding this kind of “it doesn’t matter if its wrong anyway” disclaimer.

So do you have a post (or if you can point it out in the Mann 2008 data) where it can be seen that the Tiljander data is really considered upside-down by Mann?

You’ll need to run Mann’s codes to obtain file grid_NH_proxy19.mat, check the orientation of 4th column of variable y, and then go through gridboxcps.m to verify that there is only variance matching involved (no sign changes). There might be easier ways, and note that for the EIV recon both orientations are used, depending on century ( http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=5503 )

Thank you for the detailed response. Really cannot argue against this with my knowledge and will have to rely on your word. With A. Korhola confirming this as well in the tv-show I just have to believe that this data really was used upside-down in Mann 2008.
.
The implications of this on climate science… that’s another story.

I’m apologize for assuming you may not be open minded on this. There has been quite a bit of obfuscation on the issue by Mann and associates and my reaction represents a certain grumpiness toward it. I’ll snip myself rather than continue on that.

Yes the data was used upside down. A simple and only slightly incomplete proof is here

This is from Mann’s SI, if you search for tiljander in the excel spreadsheet you quickly jump to the stats for the four proxies. Scroll to the right and you can see all have a positive correlation to a warming temperature. Of course that means they also have an upslope in the original format.

In CPS (composite plus scale) the data must be physically flipped which was allowed only for a few proxies while in EIV which I think of as an odd MV regression the flipping is more subtle and it happens automatically. The positive correlation in the sheet is rarely if ever mentioned but it means the proxies were flipped by hand prior to insertion in the CPS algorithm. Positive correlations in CPS mean no flipping is necessary of course so the data is scaled and averaged. The negative correlations were flipped over for various reasons.

It’s frustrating in that it probably doesn’t have a big effect either way. But wrong is wrong and this is clearly wrong.

Anyway when you go through the whole script, you can get the final sliver of proof which eliminates all possible doubt.

This is from Mann’s SI, if you search for tiljander in the excel spreadsheet you quickly jump to the stats for the four proxies. Scroll to the right and you can see all have a positive correlation to a warming temperature. Of course that means they also have an upslope in the original format.

This is convincing enough combined with the other documents I’ve read, ty.

This is from Mann’s SI, if you search for tiljander in the excel spreadsheet you quickly jump to the stats for the four proxies. Scroll to the right and you can see all have a positive correlation to a warming temperature. Of course that means they also have an upslope in the original format.

That correlation is 0.2987 , and you can check with corresponding d2 from propick.m :

Exact match, now you’ll need to check the peaks in 2nd column to verify that the orientation is as in Mann SuppInfo.pdf S8. Just in case, check also that temperature (3rd column) is not flipped, year 1941 is a good one to check that, that was quite cold around here ( http://www.fmi.fi/kuvat/vuosikeskilampop04.png )

Are you aware that Mann 08 chopped 60 years off the Schweingruber data and then regressed information from other proxies on the ends before screening? In fact data was ‘pasted’ on the ends of 90 percent of the proxies.

with conventional method references from 2004 and 2007. During 1960s there was some debate about these methods, but not anymore (outside climate science circles). Variance matching (who invented this, c’mon) and inverse calibration* estimators are biased towards calibration mean, and thus, when applied with Mann-smoothing and paint-instrumental-over-the-reconstruction, hockey stick generators.

The way the Tiljander data ‘flipping’ was discussed in MOT was pure ridiculous (showing two graphs where both the scale and graph were upside down = nothing changed)

Well there is one small detail that changed, THE SECOND ONE IS UPSIDE DOWN!! Gee let’s discuss the nuances of this unique inversion anomaly.

Some special education definitions of upside down for the mathematically brilliant yet oddly inversion challenged:

Math: Think of upside down as an inversion of the Y axis.
Temperature: Like a flipping of cold for hot and vice versa.
Physical: As though gravity were up.
Impossible: Standing on the ceiling.
Gymnastic: Standing on ones hands
Wierd: People on the internet who don’t understand the meaning of upside down.
Frustrated: Bending way over and peering backward through one’s legs at a temperature guage or in a vain attempt to understand the sophistry of climatology.

Steve – this exchange with Tuomas is an illustration of why I still believe you need to get a clear explanation in baby steps of the actual mechanism for the flipping. I still perceive that you are in danger of appearing to lose the argument with casual readers due to their ignorance of the mechanism and because Mike Manns argument is superficially convincing. It took William C a few days to get it and the posts at Stoat give a false view of the issues due to Williams inability to grasp the concept from the outset.The obvious counter is that your position is endorsed by Kaufman and Korhola but it would help your case if readers could easily understand the argument. The 2 posts you have linked contain much of the requirement but dont lead the reader through the steps

For Tuomas benefit the modern period is a divergence that if treated in line with the historic true part would have represented a modern mini ice age. Instead MBH08 inverted this to be treated as a modern warm period. The true historic part of the proxy is pinned to the modern part and gets flipped upside down by the inversion.

Apart from representing a serious quality issue it also represnts a major problem because the modern blade is enhanced and past variation is dampened due to a couple of mechanisms at play in how the proxy is handled.

(I don’t think anyone disagrees with this at this point, with the possible exception of the silly wabbit, who, in his bizzaro-land thinks the original researchers had the attribution wrong.)

So when Mann plotted X-ray density in the orientation he did, visually, he convinced himself and the casual observer that high density = high tempeature, i.e. the opposite of the physical meaning. After all, it had the “standard” hockey stick shape.

Note that in both orientations, the data should be interpreted as: lower density = higher temperature.

The flipping of the axis is a visual effect, which led to a physical mis-interpretation.

Remember: low density = high temperature. Mann treated the data as if it was the other way around.

Why? At the risk of touching on motive, perhaps he had hockey stick on the brain, and plotted it in such a way that it reinforced his propensity to see hockey sticks in the proxy, not necessarily delibrately, but as a consequence of confirmation bias.

Then, fortuitously, his magic algorithm took it from there, and ignored the physically inappropriate meaning.

On “mattering” – by not being corrected, the error got propagated into Kaufman. Given that the error should have been acknowledged and corrected at the time of the PNAS Reply, Mann’s stonewalling was highly unfair to Kaufman. Contrary to bender, because Kaufman didn’t use the post-1800 portion, the worst effects of the Upside Down Mann error were avoided in Kaufman. But people also need to keep in mind that these reconstructions embody a series of accounting decisions. Kaufman is sensitive to the Yamal-Briffa thing. Correcting the Upside Down thing somewhat enhances the Yamal-Briffa impact.

According to my calculations, the impact of Upside Down Tiljander on the AD800 network (and medieval networks) is noticeable, notwithstanding the new corrected smudge graph. I provided code for my calculations. But let’s say that it “doesn’t matter”. This goes back to the first problem reported in our comment. If using 4 of 15 series upside down doesn’t “matter”, then this points to problems with the algorithm as it suggests that the algorithm is “too robust” – one of the problems with Mannian principal components was that they were similarly “too robust”.

I also suspect that Tingley and Huybers 2010? (the one reported by David Appell in Scientific American) used upside down Tiljander. They show the use of a Finnish sediment series (though not its identity). They used Rutherford Mann MXD series – maybe they used Mann 2008 sediment versions. If so, that would be another propagation. In this case, CA has probably prevented further spread of the infection, as Huybers is now aware of the problem and I doubt that the network so gushingly reported by Appell will ever see the light of day.

Hmmmm…. I just thought of something. Y’know, how I was wondering how they got a stick from a data set which mostly consisted of series with divergence problem. I wonder if they used Mann 2008 infilled MXD data.

You can watch the Finnish tv program “MOT: Climate catastrophe cancelled” with Steve McIntyre and MIT professor Richard Lindzen on YouTube (The link below).

The program is made by Finnish reporter Martti Backman (the man who is sitting next to Steve McIntyre in the photo above).

Martti Backman has made several climate skeptical tv documentaries since 1997.

Backman’s “MOT: Cooling in the greenhouse” (MOT: Kylmää vettä kasvihuoneeseen) was made in 2008 which included interviews with NASA scientists Roy Spencer and John Christy. You can watch this documentary also on the web, just scroll down to the end of my message, there’s the link.

MOT: Cooling in the greenhouse (MOT: Kylmää vettä kasvihuoneeseen) Another climate skeptical tv documentary by Finnish reporter Martti Backman which includes interviews with NASA scientists Roy Spencer and John Christy. Watch the film for free: